I realize the explanation on the VT system might not be completely accurate so please bear with me. It's not like the anime expanded on it much, and the light novel wasn't much better.

Sorry if this part stinks. I've been having a bit of a hard time with this arc so it may be a bit lackluster. Hopefully the next chapter will be better.

~o.O.o~

"A new project by the German Military. It goes by the name: Valkyrie Trace System."

Clarissa felt herself stiffen as she heard the Captain's announcement. The Valkyrie Trace system, or VT system for short, was an experimental system designed by the German research division

"Did you say the Valkyrie Trace system? Wasn't that still in the experimental phase just a few months ago?" Clarissa nearly lost her grip on the phone as she tried to stay composed. Chifuyu was staring at her, but she ignored her for now. She had bigger things to worry about.

"Rest assured, the project has been perfected and all of the kinks have been worked out to ensure the most possible benefits." Enyala answered.

The fact that she didn't answer whether the user would be safe or not wasn't lost on Clarissa.

"When do you plan to do this experiment?" Clarissa asked.

"We will be doing the experiment once we are prepared to do so. Just prepare for our arrival at any point."

Clarissa tried to ask for more information, but the phone clicked and the line disconnected. Sighing, she sat back down on her seat and grabbed the glass of wine again.

"What happened?" Chifuyu asked, worry evident in her voice.

"Well...it's a bit complicated. I'd rather not talk about it." She poured more wine onto her glass and raised it to her lips slowly.

Chifuyu stood up from her seat before she took the glass away from Clarissa's hand and placed it gently on the table.

"What was that for?" Clarissa asked annoyed at the fact that her drink was taken from her. She really needed one right now and talking to the Captain just made it worse.

Chifuyu sat back down and merely looked at her with that all too familiar stare of hers. "I asked you what happened." She said this without any hints of threats or pleading, but Clarissa knew all too well what would happen if she didn't answer.

Clarissa gulped and resisted the urge to very before composing herself. "Do you know what the Valkyrie Trace system is?" She asked.

"No." She replied curtly.

Clarissa leaned back in her chair and tried to relax herself. This was going to be a long night.

"Then I guess I'm going to have to explain."

"You should."

She really needed a drink right now.

~o.O.o~

Sunlight shined through the small windows of the barracks and bathed the entire living area with light. The various recruits were moving around, preparing for the days events, but there were two who had yet to awaken.

All of them looked at the last bed on the corner of the room where two figures were blissfully sleeping. One was the boy who had introduced himself to them only yesterday and the other was their best soldier, their arms were wrapped around each other in an embrace. No one could find an odder pair, but they seemed to complement each other perfectly.

"Do you think they're together?" One of them asked.

"Laura? You really think Miss 'I can shoot you from 50 feet away wih my eyes closed' is in a relationship?" Another answered.

"Then why are they hugging and sleeping on the same bed?" Another asked.

"She was probably asleep and he just slept there last night."

"Doesn't that mean he likes her? Why else would he sleep on her bed when it's the farthest from the entrance? It couldn't have been an accident."

"..."

They all sighed in dissapoinment as they left the room. They just lost their chance of getting into a relationship that Lieutenant Clarissa kept telling them about when she read shoujo manga. They did agree on one thing, however: If anyone would benefit from a relationship, it would've been Laura 'Ice queen' Bodewig.

~o.O.o~

Laura woke up feeling like she'd just been given an energy stim. Truly, a nights worth of sleep could do wonders for you.

She tried to stand before she realized that her arms were still being pinned to her sides by her "bedmate" and she was still unabe to move. She was half expecting that voice to start mocking her at this point, but he/she/it was quiet for some reason.

"Hey, Ichika, wake up" She whispered softly to the sleeping teen next to her.

Ichika ignored her and continued to sleep. Laura noticed that he was smiling and drooling slightly, but chose to ignore it. He was probably just having a good dream she thought to herself. She focused on trying to free herself from his grip again so she could get to training.

"Mmmmm~ Marshmallow~"

That is, until he started groping her chest.

"W-What're you doing!" She turned to the side and looked at his face, but, to her surprise, he was still sleeping soundly and seemed unaware of what he was doing, "Ichika, wake up!" She yelled at him, hoping he would wake up and realize what was happening.

He seemed to twitch slightly before his face relaxed again. Unfortunately, the groping didn't seem to stop, far from it, he seemed to be kneading her more vigorously than before.

"Soft Marshmallow~" He laughed slightly as he continued to massage Laura's chest.

She supressed the redness spreading on her cheeks and resisted the urge to squeak as she tried to wake him up again, "T-That's not a marshmallow!" She pinched his cheeks as she could and hoped that it would wake him up.

"Ow~ The marshmallow bit me~" He complained as Laura continued to pinch his cheek. After a few more seconds, he released her from his grip and Laura scrambled away from the bed as fast as he could.

'That was too close...' Laura thought as she changed her clothes to her training uniform. He could just stay here for today and sleep in, it wasn't like he had to train with them, anyway.

With that thought in mind, Laura left the small barracks to join her fellow recruits in the field for todays training (torture) sessions.

~o.O.o~

Chifuyu paced in front of the group with a stern gaze fixated on them as she observed them all. She was dressed in her gray jogging attire and her hair was still in a pnytail, but she excluded and aura of command so fearsome that no one could deny she felt like she belonged here.

Her gaze seemed to linger on Laura for a few seconds longer, but no one, not even Laura, seemed to notice. With a nod, she blew the whistle around her neck and caused all of them to stand rigid in attention.

"Alright everyone, I want you to do some of the regular physical excercises that you usually do. Do two sets of these then I'll give you more excercises." Chifuyu blew the whistle again and all of them scrambled to their usual positions.

The girls started their usual excercises composed of jumping jacks, stretches, and other forms of light movement. After a while, Chifuyu whistled again and gestured for them to start jogging around the field. None of them complained since it was better than the obstacle course.

While this was going on, Chifuyu was busy thinking about what Clarissa had told her.

~o.O.o~

"Well, I just got a call from one of the heads of the Research labs." Clarissa started to explain.

"Hasn't the lab been focused on IS related research ever since 10 years ago?" Chifuyu recalled the info that Clarissa had given her before she made her trip. Apparently, the lab was assigned and legalized to research the IS if they only allowed it to be used for sports and nothing else. Every country followed the treaty Germany was no exception.

"Yes. They want to try implanting Laura with the Valkyrie Trace system in a few days."

Chifuyu racked her mind, but she couldn't find any info on it,"Valkyrie Trace? Doesn't sound familiar to me."

"The Valkyrie Trace system is designed to improve the users IS piloting capabilities by implanting a miniature version of the IS' Hyper sensor directly into the persons optical nerves. By doing this, the person can hopefully increase in performance in both in and out of the IS unit." Clarissa recalled how the scientists had proposed the idea to the military board just a few months ago.

"What's the problem" Chifuyu knew that nothing like that came without it's drawbacks.

"Almost all the users experienced severe bouts emotional instability and sadistic tendencies when they were implanted. Many of them are still recovering at clinics now due to the trauma they received." Clarissa's voice became stony as she recalled the various incidents the past few months ago, "And now they want to do it again."

"But why Laura? Is there a reason they're focusing on her?"

Clarissa sighed before continuing, "Yes. Recently they've been focused on Laura's development here at the base due to her super soldier genes."

"Super Soldier genes?" Chifuyu tilted her head to the side in confusion, "This is the first time I've heard of it."

"The Super soldier project, officially dubbed the 'Uber Soldier experiment', was a program by the German Military to create the perfect super soldier using egg donors from various women and manipulating the genes to optimal level. The experiment had varying levels of success and there was only one perfect test subject..." Clarissa trailed off at the end when she mentioned the perfect test subject.

"This perfect test subject is Laura, then." It wasn't a question, it was a statement.

"Yes. They're probably hoping this will make her immune to the drawbacks of the system and prove beneficial in the long run, but I don't believe it."

"Do you think this makes her different from any of the others?" Chifuyu asked her.

Clarissa looked down when she heard Chifuyu say that. It was true, Laura had been the perfect test subject and was released into her custody only a few months ago.

"No. She's the same as everybody else, no matter where she came from. If she's given that treatment, she'll be as vulnerable as the rest. She's just as human as the rest of us." Clarissa affirmed.

But that didn't mean she thought that she was some kind of pet project. Far from it, Laura was one of the people she was closest to here and no amount of experimentation would change that.

Chifuyu smiled slightly as she heard Clarissa's answer, "Alright then, tell me everything you know and we'll see what we can do."

~o.O.o

Chifuyu sighed as she remembered what happened the previous night. She acted like she was some kind of savior, but the truth was she didn't know what she could do for Laura either. They just had to hope for something to come to them.

"Um~ Miss Orimura?" She heard a voice beside her ask.

She looked to the side and the girl in question immediately squeaked in fright. She didn't notice that all her thinking made her face contort to a light scowl.

"Yes, what is it?"

"W-Well we finished the training exercise and we were wondering what to do" The girl nervously replied. She was a rookie by the looks of it.

Chfuyu thought to herself for a bit before an idea came to her, "Everyone, we'll be doing pairs excercises for now so grab a partner."

Everyone started mumbling to themselves in excitement. Pair activities were rare nowadays and they were always fun to do together.

"Ah, of course I'll be joining in as well so I'll be needing a partner too." Chifuyu suddenly added.

"..."

All the noise from girls immediately stopped and they turned to stare at Chifuyu.

"I'll just pick the person who has no partn-"

Before Chifuyu could complete her sentence, all of the girls scrambled around and immediately grabbed the closest person they could find. In just 30 seconds, everyone in the area was paired.

Except for two people.

Laura and the recruit beside her were the only two who were apart from the group when they paired up so they were left to the wolves so to speak. The girl beside Chifuyu was visibly shaking in terror now while Laura just seemed confused at what happened.

"Since everyone picked the person closest to them, I guess I will too." Before the girl could voice her protest, Chifuyu placed her hand on her shoulder and immediately the girls shaking worsened as Chifuyu dragged her with her.

"Alright, lets start the-"

"Miss Orimura, please wait a moment."

Chifuyu looked to where the voice originated from and saw Laura looking at her, "What is it Bodewig?" She asked.

"I do not have a partner, does this mean I am exempt from the exercise?"

"What are you talking about? You have a partner just like everybody else."

"Everyone has already paired up and you took Brier with you as your partner." Laura was genuinely confused. Didn't everyone already have a pair?

"Who else apart from Clarissa is here and isn't doing anything?" Chifuyu had to stop herself from smiling when Laura's faced blushed and right eye twitched slightly.

"T-That would be your brother, Miss Orimura." Laura answered in a soft voice.

"There's your partner, go wake him up and tell him to change into some of his training clothes and come back here as fast as you can."

Laura wanted to protest but held herself back. There was no need to anger the person who could most likely turn her into an ash pile on the floor she reasoned to herself.

Chifuyu sighed softly to herself as she watched Laura go back to the barracks. This was a gamble, but it was the only thing she could do for now.

She wondered if she could truly count on her brother to help her if the time came or if everything would be all right. Hopefully she would find out in the days to come.

She was also beginning to wonder why the girl beside her seemed to be hyperventilating and looked like she was about to faint when Chifuyu tightened her grip on her shoulder slightly. She hoped she could find out about why in the days to come, too.